Writing progress in general:

I’ve been floundering with these stories, I confess. The last time I did a “story of the week” project successfully for a full year, back in 2007, I actually cheated a little bit by pulling in some stories that I had already written, editing them a bit, and calling them fresh. But this time, I wonder if I’m beginning to slow down because I’m getting a little burned out. Maybe. I’m not sure. I have six of these stories left to write.

I’m also technically participating in National Novel Writing Month, but I’ve written very little in Witness to the Scourge. But the month is only halfway through, so I have plenty of time to start up (though I’m not sure I can reach 50,000 words by the 30th).

Last week’s story:

As always, I am behind. And way behind this time! I only just finished Story No. 45 today. “The Last Testament of Tianna Chai” is more of a general idea than a story, but, as always, it has potential. And last week’s story I started only today as well. But I think “The Wacky Dead” will be a good one, because I’m taking more time with it.

Of course, I’m going back to the office this week. The very long government shutdown meant that I was on furlough for that entire time, and then I got to work from home for the remainder of last week. Me, I like working at home, though I know a couple of people who don’t. I feel that I’m more productive than I am in the office, but that’s neither here nor there. The point is, I will have less time to write moving forward.

Of course, that hasn’t really stopped me so far. I was working at home for the majority of the year, up until mid-June, when I went back into the office. And I still got my writing done.

Truth to tell, I would prefer to spend my time writing than working at my day job, but I only know a couple of writers who are in that position.

Anyway. On to the new week!

This week’s prompt:

I rolled a 2 on the d8, meaning to draw the prompt from the Fantasy deck; and a 2 on the d6, meaning to make the story a romance story.

Romantasy? I’ve rolled this combination of dice before, I know, but in all honesty I don’t recall how it turned out. I have been tracking the stories I’ve written for this project, but only their titles. I do wish I’d done a better job of tracking word counts and the individual prompts. Of course I could go back to each blog entry and track down the prompt and the associated die roll, but at the moment that feels like more work than my poor addlepated brain can handle. So here’s this week’s prompt:

A fighter wants to open an ancient door that can only be unlocked by a celestial amulet, but it will mean shattering an old truce.

Each time I’ve rolled Romance before, I’ve sort of made the romance secondary to the plot driven by the prompt. I think that this time, I will work on making the romance the main focus of the story, rather than a “side-quest”. I think that’s how romance writers do it. I’m not sure. I still don’t know how to write romance. It occurs to me that maybe I ought to read some to figure out how it’s done. And since this is a fantasy romance, does that make it a romantasy? I’m not sure. I’ll have to draw on my writer/reader friends to find some good titles to read.

Onward!

This week’s recommendation:

We’re only two episodes in, but Plur1bus by Vince Gilligan, streaming on Apple TV+, is already breaking my little brain. I’m really enjoying this series. It was, as you may know, created by Vince Gilligan, creator of Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul… two shows which I have never seen, but which I am assured are master classes in how to develop characters and how to write dialogue. A friend of mine, a fellow writer, told me how he would watch an episode of Breaking Bad and take copious notes of the dialogue, how each line would develop a character or contribute to a scene.

I see that happening in Plur1bus. So watch this show, and be happy.

And that’s all!

Be safe, be kind, be punk, and keep on being weird. We’ve only got this one life, this one world, and the only way we’ll make it through is together.